by Sarah Noffke
“Yes, that’s the biggest concern. That’s why I need your full consent,” Aiden said.
“So Zephyr signed me up for this, did he? I guess I’m the expendable one,” Connor said, crossing his arms in front of his chest, his eyes on the salamander tattoo on his forearm that was surrounded by grass and flowers and various other objects.
“That’s definitely not the case. I think that you were just chosen because you might be more willing,” Aiden said.
“Because I’ve tried to kill myself multiple times and so if I die, no one will really care?” Connor said, his voice hollow.
“Honestly, I don’t know why you were chosen, but you should know that Zephyr had nothing to do with this decision,” Aiden said.
“What? He didn’t? Who picked me to go through conversion and possibly die?” Connor said, and then realized at once that he didn’t need that question answered. He already knew.
“It was Adelaide. She picked you to be the first werewolf converted,” Aiden said.
Chapter Six
“The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty. Plainly, the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon a definition of liberty.”
- Abraham Lincoln
The fog had just slipped in, covering the street up ahead, when the change took over Hunter. He welcomed it like one would an old friend, embracing the wolf who longed to escape its cage. Dark orange claws shot out of his fingertips, making a splitting sound as they did. The fangs always hurt when they tore through the roof of his mouth, but it was a pleasurable pain, one Hunter looked forward to all week. The fur was the one part of the werewolf that he didn’t appreciate. The man knew that this was how the authorities were able to string his murders together. Soon this might lead them to him. He may even need to get out of Los Angeles soon, but not until his last job was done. That’s how he thought of the women he killed. They were jobs and it was his responsibility to take them out, ridding the world of their repulsive existence.
Pulling his boxy chin down, Hunter peered through the alleyway. He’d already taken the liberty of destroying the street lamps that usually bathed the cramped alley in light at this late hour. Also, thinking that the security camera on the corner might catch a bit of the alley, he went ahead and destroyed that too. Tonight he was going to have fun. He was going to make her run. That would be the best part, when she tried to escape, believed that she did, only to be tackled.
Beside Hunter’s feet sat a box. It didn’t have enough holes in it, but what did he care. He unfolded the top and pulled a small gray kitten from it. “Be still,” the werewolf growled against the kitten, holding the tabby by the scruff of its neck. That afternoon he’d given his best act, convincing the animal shelter staff that this kitten would make the perfect gift for his little boy. Hunter didn’t have a little boy. He was never having children. If his years in prison taught him anything, it was that everyone was inherently bad and breeding should be outlawed.
The creaking of the back door of the library pulled his attention away from the feline in his grasp.
“Bye, Billy. I’ll see you tomorrow. Oh dear,” a woman said with surprise. She ducked back into the door. “Hey, tell maintenance that the street lights have burned out.”
“Okay, can do,” another voice said, more distant.
“Thanks, honey. You’re the best,” the woman said.
Hunter narrowed his dark eyes at the woman. She always made a show of being nice, but no one was more fake. Helen Goodman might have pretended to be the sweet old librarian, but he knew she rolled her eyes at the kids she belittled.
“Reading is important for your education,” she’d told him, knowing he was dyslexic. What a patronizing thing to say to a child who couldn’t read. She was in essence saying that he was going to be a failure. It was so heavily implied. And still she piled up books and shoved them at him every time he visited the library as a kid. He wasn’t there to read, but rather to avoid his crazy stepfather who often was looking to bully Hunter. And then there had been the one time she caught Hunter with his hands in his pants and banned him from the library. She’d all but cursed him to be beaten every afternoon. Helen wasn’t a nice old librarian, but rather a witch who wanted him to fail. She was all but responsible for his failure.
When Helen’s rubber-soled shoes stepped onto the pavement of the alleyway, Hunter twisted the kitten’s body. Not enough to kill it, but enough to produce a screeching meow. The kitten’s tiny claws pierced into Hunter’s palm. He kneeled over it and flashed his fangs at the animal.
The old woman’s steps halted. She turned to the corner where the meow had come from.
Again Hunter squeezed the animal, causing another cry of help.
“Oh, is there a little kitty over there? Here kitty kitty,” Helen said, tiptoeing in the direction of Hunter and the kitten.
Hunter gripped his hand on the top of the kitten’s head, and the animal let out a series of little meows, probably sensing what was coming next. With a quick twist of the kitten’s head it instantly fell limp, just as Helen stepped around the corner. In the dark she probably couldn’t see much but the glow of Hunter’s orange eyes. He tossed the dead kitten at the woman’s feet, as he flashed his canines. The scream that soared out of her mouth told him she could make out enough of the scene to know she’d met a monster.
Helen’s frantic eyes darted to the dead kitten at her feet and then to the beast in front of her. She startled backward, knocking into the corner of the brick building. Shaking, she turned and then ran, her fat legs moving too slowly. This was more of a joke than a pursuit for freedom. Hunter let the woman get far into the long alleyway before crouching down. He watched the whites of her varicose vein–filled legs jiggle as she ran, his heightened eyesight making all the details crisp in the dark. When the woman was almost to the end of the alleyway, she threw her head over her shoulder, relief probably filling her slightly when she realized she wasn’t being pursued.
The howl that ripped from Hunter’s mouth made the woman pause. She turned completely around, her back to the street behind her. Maybe she was paralyzed with fear. Maybe she thought she was safe since the sidewalk was just a few feet away from her. The old woman leaned forward, peering into the dark. She was curious, just like the kitten had been. And soon she’d share the fate of the kitten. With a long growl Hunter set off at a sprint. Helen’s eyes widened with horror, another scream rocketing from her mouth as he approached. Just when he was close to her, he scaled up the brick wall until over her head and then sprung off and landed on top of the old woman, knocking her to the concrete. Several cracks followed the action, the sound of her old bones breaking.
“No, no, no,” Helen said, shaking her head at Hunter as he pulled back from her.
“Oh yes,” he said, baring his teeth and sinking his hungry mouth into her neck. He only allowed himself a small taste before pulling himself off the old woman, who was still half alive. Then he grabbed her by her fat leg and dragged her back into the alleyway where he could enjoy his feast in the peace of the dark.
Chapter Seven
“Man and the mule are always tame; the leopard and the wolf are invariably wild.”
- Aristotle
“So these are our new digs?” Kaleb said, eyeing the walls which looked the same as the ones all over the Institute. They were stainless steel, but according to Aiden, they’d been reinforced so that if Rio got antsy as a werewolf, he couldn’t punch his way out of the room. The space was also stocked with meat, which had specifically been brought in for the pack, but only on the nights they changed. This was in an effort to keep the werewolves as tame as possible.
There were no beds or recreational activities set up for the three men because the wolf didn’t sleep or play. Anything left in the room would only be destroyed by the werewolves. It was a restless beast that resented being confined during the change. The
pack had commiserated on how angry this imprisonment made the wolf. It wanted to run. To smell the air. To hunt.
“What we need is somewhere to run,” Zephyr said, eyeing the room with dissatisfaction.
“What you need is to not be allowed free to maim innocent people,” Rox said, lingering by the door.
Kaleb had almost wanted to be like Connor, and chosen for the conversion procedure. However, he knew that he’d risk losing his ability to pause time. And there was no way he was going to give that up. None of the other agents seemed to like him, but they were just jealous. And at least he had the pack, which only tolerated him a bit better. He wasn’t sure how he’d made everyone loathe him so much, but it had always been that way. He was the annoying kid. The tagalong. The one that people probably made fun of behind his back. Not that he really cared. Well, sometimes he cared, but he hoped it didn’t show.
“I’ve got dibs on the short ribs,” he said, peering into the crate that held an assortment of meats.
“How about I fight you for it, Runt?” Rio said, smacking his fist into his palm.
Maybe Aiden could figure out a way to extract half the testosterone out of Rio in order to make him more tolerable. Big guys always thought they could bully Kaleb because he was afraid of having his face punched off. They might have been right, but giving them the satisfaction of knowing that wasn’t going to happen.
“How about I just pause time and eat most of our stock?” Kaleb said, puffing his chest out.
“How about you mutts both play tug-of-war? I brought you a load of dog toys to fight over,” Rox said, pointing at a separate bin full of squeaky toys, thick ropes, and balls.
“Ha-ha. There will be no fighting. We will be practicing combat, but no real hits. Let’s use this time to hone our skills and practice fighting together. It may seem easy, but when in the heat of a situation, things change. A team needs to anticipate what the other members are going to do in a fight,” Zephyr said. Always the voice of rationality. It wasn’t that Kaleb didn’t like the guy. That was impossible. Everyone inherently liked Silver Streak. It was just that he was always shutting Kaleb down, making him feel even smaller.
“I don’t see why you think I need to practice fighting. I’m not going on any of these werewolf missions. I’m an agent, remember?” Kaleb said, pointing at his chest.
“And as Adelaide mentioned before she left, agents are always trained in combat because you can’t only rely on your Dream Traveler skill. If it fails then you need to have a backup,” Zephyr said.
“All right, you pooches do something entertaining. I’ll be watching from the other room. Don’t bore me to death by drooling and licking yourself, like usual,” Rox said, indicating the two-way mirror on the far wall.
“Is that all it will take to bring on your death? Good to know,” Zephyr said, his voice dry. However, Kaleb was an observer and watched the way Zephyr’s eyes lingered longer on Rox. Yes, it was no doubt because she was hot, but there was more to it. He studied her. Watched her with more than an attraction in his gaze.
“If something happens to me then you doggies will have to be euthanized because there’s no one else willing to do your training,” Rox said.
Zephyr shook his head, his carefully arranged black and silver hair catching the light overhead. That guy could keep the hair gel companies in business all by himself. “Aiden already in the room, I presume?” Zephyr asked.
“Yeah, he’s going to be monitoring Connor, so don’t you fret over your little pup,” Rox said, stepping out of the room, sending the door shut behind her. A series of clicks followed, which were the reinforcements locking into place. Since Rio had joined the pack, the safe rooms had to be rebuilt stronger because God thought giving the brute super strength was a good idea. Everyone’s skills in the pack seemed to have a strange irony. Like Kaleb, who was always trying to pass the time, had the gift to stop it.
Kaleb felt his chest vibrate just as his pores widened. That was always the first change. He pulled his gaze up to Zephyr’s. The alpha wolf’s eyes glowed gray just as the silver and black hair grew into place.
“Show time,” Rio said with a growl.
Connor’s room actually had furniture, because there was a chance he’d be a man for the entire night. Men slept at night. They sat when they ate. They ate meat that was cooked, not raw. Wolves didn’t sleep at night. They crouched over their prey when they ate. And they preferred their meat warm, the blood recently beating.
Sitting slouched in a soft chair, Connor thumbed through the Dream Traveler Codex. No matter how many times he read the book, he still felt like he was missing something. Ren’s passages seemed to be filled with surface knowledge and also hidden meanings. Was this how Adelaide’s book read? He couldn’t imagine having a father like Ren Lewis, a man who was revered by his race. Connor’s own father had been a deadbeat. He didn’t like that word for some reason, maybe because he knew his whole life that his father was very much alive, since he had lived down the block from Connor and his mother.
The man who had supplied the sperm to create Connor enjoyed flaunting his flashy new cars and prancing his new girlfriends around the neighborhood, knowing full well that Connor’s mother’s V-bug hadn’t run reliably in years. Still, his mother would never ask for money. She said it was her Irish blood that made her stubborn, but he knew it was that she didn’t want her ex-husband to ridicule her, telling her she was too worthless to make money. His father should have offered money to take care of his only son, but a coward doesn’t raise his responsibilities.
“How are you doing?” Aiden’s voice buzzed over the intercom.
Connor lowered the book and stared at the mirrored window, not able to see the scientist who sat on the other side. “I’m a bit tired. I feel like eating, but I don’t want to get up. And I’m slightly bored,” he said.
A chuckle echoed back at him. “Those are all human feelings. I’d say this is hopeful. We might have extracted the wolf,” Aiden said.
The procedure had been much less painful and scary than when Olento Research had turned him into a werewolf. That had been an experience full of restraints and violent cutting and sawing. However, he simply went to sleep on a table in the Institute and then woke up a few hours later. The key was that he awoke. Maybe Adelaide would be disappointed when she found out that he survived the procedure. Connor balled up his fists at the thought of the girl. Why did she get to him? Why did he care that she wanted him dead?
After the procedure they’d kept him comfortably sedated for a day, but now it was show time. The pack would be changing into werewolves tonight, but would Connor? He actually wasn’t certain how he felt about losing the wolf. Yes, he never wanted to be a werewolf, but now that he was, it felt like he was losing a part of himself by getting rid of it. Inside of him he still felt the wolf, barking its desires, growling its disappointment. However, that didn’t mean he’d still change. Maybe he’d just suffer with the wolf in his head, not subjected to the claws and fangs that sought to ravage.
The cuff on Connor’s arm constricted, automatically turning on. All night he’d have his vitals taken so that Aiden could monitor him for potential hazards. Apparently just waking from the procedure didn’t mean he was in the clear. Getting past this change was the real danger. After a minute the cuff sank back down to normal.
“Blood pressure is a bit elevated,” the disembodied voice of Aiden said.
“What can I say? I’m stressed. That happens when someone tries to reverse the things Olento Research did to them,” Connor said with a morbid laugh.
“Just try and relax,” Aiden said.
Connor pulled at the sensor around his torso. The heart rate monitor pinched his skin. He pulled at it, causing the material to break. “Oops,” he said, pulling the sensor off completely. “Your device appears to be a bit flimsy. Material must have been worn.”
“It wasn’t,” Aiden said. “Your heart rate was increasing. I’m guessing it’s even higher now.”
“Why would you guess that?” Connor said, his eyes narrowed at the mirror in front of him.
“Did you say that you have more strength when in werewolf form?” Aiden said.
“Well, yeah, but I haven’t changed,” Connor said, staring at his arms covered in tattoos and not reddish hair.
“Yes, but it’s possible that the traits of the werewolf are still coming out during the normal change period,” Aiden said.
The adrenaline surged through Connor, the same feeling he had when on drugs. It coursed through his blood, making him feel unstoppable. Making him want to throw himself off a building just to increase the feeling. He shot into a standing position, needing to run, to scale the walls. More than ever he felt the need to move, to tear through the forest, to tear through a carcass of warm flesh.
He held up his hand. It looked the same as it always did. Pinkish fingernails on a shaking hand. The scorching ache felt like it was seeking to split open his head. He reached for his mouth, his hand knocking into the long fangs. “Fuck!” he said, scratching his cheek with the hands that now had claws. The change hadn’t been stopped. It had only been paused and now it was happening on an angrier level, like the wolf was seeking to punish him for trying to erase him. A growl, loud and raw, made Connor’s throat vibrate. There was no separating himself from the wolf. They were one and he had to accept it. Warmth spread through his chest as he crouched down low, stealthily making his way for the food set up for him in the corner. Connor had to admit it, he was grateful the procedure had failed.
Chapter Eight
“It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism, while the wolf remains of a different opinion.”
- William Ralph Inge
“I found her snooping around in one of the labs,” Haiku said, pulling Kris forward by the arm. “I checked surveillance and I don’t know how she got in. She asked to see you. Said you could vouch for her.”